Trendy But Casual

I am rubbish

Wednesday is our ninth wedding anniversary. Last week we were looking at the wedding photo we have tucked away, out of sight, in the chaos of our back room. “That was the last time I smiled,” announced T. Middy. I ignored him.

Yesterday I asked him why we were still happily married. He attributes this solely to his “incredible patience and willingness to concede.” Apparently, I bring very little to the table.  He conceded, at last, that I was “funny-ish and brainy-ish,” and that was helpful, sort of.

When TM is not criticizing me, he can be very useful: he created a spiffy flyer for my new novel, Ruined, that we sent to independent book stores in Mississippi and Louisiana. I now have three out-of-state events booked. The upcoming ones are around Halloween: Square Books in Oxford, MS, on October 30, and Lemuria Books, in Jackson, on Halloween itself.

I met a lot of other booksellers on Friday at the SIBA convention in Greenville, SC. I was on a panel of mystery writers, and then took part in a frenetic hour-long book-signing session afterwards. More invitations to appear at stores in Mississippi, Alabama, North Carolina. I’ll try to fit some more in before Christmas, if possible, though this semester is horribly busy. Afterwards I was taken out for dinner by the friendly Scholastic sales reps. Greenville is a very pretty town.

The trip there, however, was a nightmare. I almost missed the panel altogether, even though I left home at 5:45 that morning. (The panel started at 4:10 PM.) My 7:15 flight to Atlanta had mechanical problems, and didn’t leave New Orleans until 10. So I missed the connection to Greenville; the next flight from Atlanta was delayed until 3:20, which meant I wouldn’t arrive at the convention in time. So I had to get changed in an airport bathroom, rent the most expensive car ever from Avis in Atlanta, and make the 150-mile drive.

The Avis experience took 90 minutes, and included their computers going down on numerous occasions; me losing the rental agreement somewhere between the bus and the exit gate; and a second wait in line to get another. By the time I got to the convention center in Greenville, my panel was in its final ten minutes. The only good thing about the trip was the 80s station on Sirius radio.

The next morning, Saturday, on my way back to New Orleans, I managed to misplace my ID. I’d stuffed it into a pocket of my bag when driving – wildly – out of the Avis lot, and then shoved it, along with a handful of booksellers’ business cards, into my suitcase. Cue: panic in Greenville airport. I returned to the rental car to search it before remembering the suitcase card-dump. And what did I find in the car? The lost rental agreement, down the side of the passenger seat. Not so brainy-ish, obviously. I was glad to get home in one piece, back to the incredible patience of T. Middy.

Now it’s Sunday night. I took part in an ACLU “banned books” event this afternoon, reading a section of Midnight’s Children. I came home and finished writing a review of the new Margaret Atwood novel, The Year of the Flood. Then tonight: The Amazing Race and Mad Men. (Never call me on a Sunday night.)

The weather tomorrow in New Orleans: a high of 91. Near record temperatures. So much for the season of mists and mellow fruitfulness. But at least there’s something decent to watch on TV again.

Ball Season

This is another family post, FYI, because my niece looked so glamorous last night. She was off to the St Peter's College ball - held at the same venue, with exactly the same food, as the Avondale ball two weeks ago. Rebecca wore the dress she had made for that ball, with the key addition of a pair of my mother's evening gloves - the gloves are fifty years old, we think. This pic is dark, I know, but it's of my sister buttoning Rebecca into the gloves.

And this is her a little later, and with her escort, Cameron. He realized this week (after he'd asked her to the ball) that they were in the same class at kindergarten. She will object, no doubt, to these pictures, but I think they're cute. And I have a soft spot for St Peter's boys - well, one in particular.

My Sister's Birthday

Yesterday we held a party to celebrate my sister's 50th birthday, so today we're all completely exhausted. I managed to put of starting any work today until it was almost dark outside.

The party was hosted by her good friends, Lindsey and Tony, who have a beautiful contemporary house on Marine Parade in Herne Bay. At any given point during the party, it seemed as though half the guests were there simply to nose around the house, with various tour groups traipsing around from room-to-room. I was trying to get trays of food out of the oven while two guys examined the stove, splashback, drawers, cupboard finishing, etc. I had to burn them with trays to get them out of my way.

The party managed to combine two typical New Zealand pastimes: nosing around open homes, and eating. As expected, everyone stuffed their faces as though they'd been fasting all week - even though the party was in the afternoon, after lunch and before dinner. We served up platter after platter of sushi; blinis with hot smoked salmon; risotto cakes; meatballs with barbecue sauce; rosti with various dips and toppings; and the red pepper tarts I've been making, to an increasingly approximate remembered recipe, for years. All were scoffed by our apparently near-starving guests. I had four young helpers, all of whom did an excellent job passing around food; my niece and her friend, Kate, were flopped on the sofas like rag dolls by the end of the party. My nephew tended bar, and was last seen heading off into the night to watch the rugby with his friends, a box of Coronas under his arm.

Lindsey has an amazing piano, so my brother-in-law was charged with hiring a pianist. He didn't just get any pianist: he got Billy Joel. Deryn was really good, especially when he played "Comfortably Numb," one of my favourite songs. (He didn't sing at all until the end, when he did "Piano Man," after which we managed to herd everyone but the serious overstayers out into the rain.)

I wish I had some photos, especially of the flowers by Leaf and Honey, which were SO beautiful, or the giant yummy chocolate-and-whiskey cake from Rocket Kitchen, on which my sister's complicated name was, fortunately, correctly spelled. But my camera was hidden away upstairs, and I was too busy feeding the starving millions. It reminded me of the endless weddings my parents used to attend, and their verdicts afterwards, which were always based on food, quality and quantity: "not much to eat" meant an unenjoyable wedding. Hopefully everyone enjoyed themselves. Some people enjoyed themselves so much they trampled chocolate cake all over the floor, which I enjoyed scraping off later.

My brother-in-law put together a slide show we played on my computer - pictures of my sister through the years. There were some of the two of us, and, in the absence of anything more recent, I include them here. The first two were taken in my grandparents' front garden, at the old house, now gone, on Ponsonby Road. The third is of us with my brother at Auckland Airport, I think, in the days when my mother forced us to dress nicely, in the manner of visitors from the Austrian Tirol. And the last is of the two of us at Fox Glacier in 1981, when I was 15 and she was 22, and I looked like a boy giant with a Lady Diana hair-do.

Family Concerns

My parents are in Canada at the moment, about to embark on an Alaskan cruise, so they're missing out on various key events - i.e. my niece's pre-ball festivities last Saturday, and my sister's fiftieth birthday yesterday. (Her bitter words of wisdom for my brother and me: "It'll be your turn soon!) The following pictures are for them. If you're not a member of our family, please come back another time.

The first picture is the gathering glamorous hordes; the second of Rebecca and one of her friends, Ryan; the next is of some of the gaggle of boys lurking in the dining room, waiting for more girls to make grand entrances. Jack, Rebecca's date, is the one with the long hair. The pic is of everyone assembled just before they left for Eden Park, where the ball was held. What you can't see in the photo is the dozen or so parents drinking wine and snapping pictures.

Of course, I think my niece looked absolutely gorgeous, but she has informed me I'm a very biased observer. Just because I think she is the most beautiful and intelligent girl in the Southern Hemisphere! I'll write more about school balls later, in one of my "How Times Have Changed" posts, but to keep on-message, here are some photos of us all at Sal Rose restaurant in Mt Albert last night. Certain family members are acting the goat. My sister's big party is on Saturday, and will be lavish. Last night was pizza and silliness.

That's my brother and sister; my sister and niece; and my nephew and brother-in-law. Afterwards, we went back to the house in Mt Albert to eat apple strudel, sing "Happy Birthday," and watch - once again - the video of Christian the lion's 1972 reunion with his former owners.

Addemdum: thanks to my friend Emily Simpson for lending Rebecca a pair of chic Kathryn Wilson shoes for the ball.